The “Games for Decolonization” project’s primary output of research-creation is the Tarot for Decolonization Deck. Guided by workshop participants Mimi Khúc, creator of the Asian-American Tarot, and Indigenous Two Spirit tarot practitioner and author of Red Tarot (2024) Christopher Marmolejo, the Tarot for Decolonization Deck will adapt the mechanics of tarot to facilitate conversation through terminology and imagery that thematize Indigenous and settler relationships to land, history, and sovereignty.
Traditionally, tarot cards have been seen as a tool that purportedly helps the player gain insight into the past, present or future. However, tarot does this work through a kind of relational spontaneous storytelling that takes place between the player and the reader. Moving away from the occult associations of this activity, our project positions the methodological practice of reading tarot cards as an opportunity to cultivate a relational and dialogic understanding of settler colonialism and its impacts that emerge through a storytelling engagement with decolonial themes.
Each card in the Tarot deck carries a wealth of symbolic imagery. These symbols act as triggers for storytelling, inviting the reader and querent (person who is having the reading done) to explore their meanings in the context of the question or situation at hand. The reader then weaves these meanings together by considering not only individual cards but also the relationships between them, compelling the querent to similarly draw out relationships to and between the cards. Card combinations create a narrative flow, encouraging a more nuanced and interconnected storytelling experience.
A decolonized version of this process would then be two-fold. First, the questions posed would prompt reflection on the reader’s relationship to the land, settler colonialism, and/or Indigenous sovereignty. Secondly, the images presented on their cards themselves and their symbolic meaning would be reimagined to communicate essential concepts, ideas, symbols, and archetypes the connect with real lived Indigenous experience as well as to the process of truth and reconciliation.
In consultation with Indigenous community members and participants at the Pop Pedagogies Symposium, a series of themes and archetypes for the deck, which is traditionally 78 cards divided into the major arcana (22 cards) and the minor arcana (56 cards), will be identified. While this process will determine its own ends, Nijdam, Khúc, and Marmolejo will guide the conversation to help illuminate what a tarot deck for decolonization might look like. For example, a tarot deck that seeks to foster dialogue on decolonization would be a culturally inclusive tool that reflects diverse perspectives on Indigenous-settler relations from an Indigenous perspective, fostering narratives of Indigenous experience through symbolism and archetypes. These symbols and archetypes might, therefore, reflect perspectives on the path to and hurdles in the process of truth and reconciliation. Like “Cards for Decolonization,” it might play with stereotypes of Indigenous experience, but the “Tarot Deck for Decolonization” would replace satire with earnest dialogue to force settlers to reflect on archetypes that either problematically reinforce or challenge traditional power structures. The Tarot for Decolonization Deck will thereby be a tool for reflection, empowerment, and cultural appreciation, inviting users to explore diverse perspectives on Indigenous experience that challenge established settler-Indigenous relationships through collaborative and dialogic storytelling.
Then, drawing from the UBC Comics Studies Cluster’s network in Vancouver and beyond, the project will commission the illustration of these cards from Indigenous cartoons and graphic artists living on the North West Coast, such Cole Pauls, Whess Harman, Gord Hill, bailey macabre, and Alina Pete.